


Meadow Darling

by yourlocalai



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bittersweet Ending, Gen, Post-Magic Reveal, mild body horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-12
Updated: 2019-06-14
Packaged: 2020-05-01 18:00:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19182913
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yourlocalai/pseuds/yourlocalai
Summary: Fulfilling one's destiny apparently comes with a catch. The more magic returns to Camelot, the more Merlin starts to disappear.





	1. Prologue

There. Do you see it? A light on the hilltop, shining like a piece of fallen starlight. Move toward it. It’s what you need.

Be careful of the faces around you, calling out from their stone prisons. Distractions, all of them. Let them flow past you, familiar to forgotten. It’s for the best.

_He’s been like this all day._

The forest is beautiful this time of year, isn’t it? So lush and green, all the streams at their fullest, but you mustn’t linger. The hilltop is past this. You’ve come so far, don’t lose sight of it now.

Here, clear this brush away. The path is just beyond, spiraling up and up. A bit of a climb, I know, but it will be worth it. I promise. 

_His fever is getting worse._

Quickly now, the clouds are rolling in. You don’t want to be caught out here when they finally break.

You’re almost there!

_Wake up. Please, wake up._

There it is! Reach out and grab it, yes, just like that. Oh, welcome home Emrys.

Isn’t it wonderful?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like I'm in the minority of people who actually really like second person lol, but for all you folks out there who hate it don't worry, just this little chapter is written in it. I have to admit though, it was a fun little experiment. 
> 
> Who's ready to throw away fifteen hundred years of Arthurian legend for some hand-wavy magical bullshit? The good news is that this fic is mostly finished. Five chapters total and I'm mostly done with chapter four. It should all be up by the end of the week.


	2. Of Change

Merlin aches. For a time, it is the only thing he knows.

It is too hot, and he makes an effort to kick off the weight pressing down on him, trapping him in this suffocating heat. He manages little more than a twitch of the ankle and a weak groan.

It is enough to draw attention. Footsteps come nearer, and then a hand is on his forehead. Dry and soft, with thin fingers and knobby knuckles, it is so blessedly cool he can’t help but lean into it.

Someone speaks, but he can’t make it out. All he knows is that the hand vanishes, leaving him moaning in distress and renewing his struggles. He’s only managed to exhaust himself when the hand returns, sliding to the back of his neck and pulling him upward. The movement makes him nauseous, but the cloth soaked in water placed to his lips is worth it.

He cannot swallow, his throat will not work properly, but just letting it flow over his tongue and soothe his dry gums and cracked lips is enough. He almost starts to cry when the cloth is taken away, his head lowered gently back onto a pillow he can only now tell is damp.

The voice is back, but the meaning of the words slides past his grip like oil. He thinks he would rather go back to sleep.

He was having such a nice dream. 

~*~

The next time he wakes, he feels much more aware. Aware enough to know that he is weakened by and reeks of sickness.

Peeling his eyes open is an effort, crusted shut as they are, but when he does he sees that he is in the main chamber, sleeping in Gaius’s bed. Several days’ worth of medicine phials and bowls are sitting on the nightstand.

Gaius himself is seated at the table, his back turned to Merlin as he eats. It must be suppertime. Merlin’s stomach roils at the thought.

“Gaius?”

His voice is paper thin, but it is so quiet here that Gaius hears him anyway, his spoon clattering to the table as he hurries to stand.

He freezes as soon as they lock eyes, the color draining out of his cheeks.

“Merlin?”

The fact that it is a question should probably be worrying, but Merlin is too tired to feel much of anything. He focuses instead on the fine tremors running through his body, trying to still them. It doesn’t work. 

“Merlin?” Gaius asks again, his steps cautious as he moves forward. He looks like he is approaching a wild beast, and the thought is silly enough to make Merlin smile. Gaius’s frown grows more pronounced. “Can you see me?”

“Mmhmm…why?”

He meant to ask _why are you looking at me like that_ , but his voice cracked and gave out before he finished. Still, he thinks he got the point across.

Gaius moves across the room to his workstation, rifling through his drawers and pulling out one of his small, handheld mirrors. Merlin isn’t strong enough to reach out and take it, so Gaius holds it before his face.

His eyes are gold. Completely, solidly gold, the whites, irises, and pupils all blending together into one solid mass. The effect is mesmerizing.

“M’not doin’ that,” he says. Some distant part of his mind is starting to panic, but it is drowned out by his own detachment. This strange reflection cannot be his face. Why should he be concerned with what it looks like?

He falls asleep before Gaius can so much as set the mirror down.

~*~ 

It is dark the third time he wakes, and Gaius is sitting slumped and exhausted by his bedside.

It must have been a dream, he thinks, even as he knows it to be real. He brings a hand up to his face, poking and prodding around his eyes as if some tangible marker would have been left on his skin, but feels nothing amiss. Gaius holds the mirror up again.

A part of him has always liked the golden glow in his eyes, a piece of his truth that refuses to be hidden away, but this? This is inhuman.

“How are you feeling?” Gaius asks.

“Tired,” he says, not looking away from his reflection, “sore. Gaius…”

“I’ve looked. I found no clues as to what might be causing this. What of your magic, can you feel anything?”

“I’m not using it right now,” he says. He is familiar enough with his own magic to know what it is not, but as a test, he levitates one of the bowls on his nightstand, watching it rise about a foot before gently floating back down. “Did they change?”

Gaius shakes his head, setting the mirror aside with a sigh. “We can solve this later. For now, you should focus on regaining your strength.”

Reaching one hand behind Merlin’s back and another underneath his thighs, he lifts Merlin until he is mostly sitting upright, supported by a nest of pillows. It should be exhausting for him, but Merlin is the one left shaking by the end of it.

Gaius hands him a bowl, plain broth inside. “Here, eat.” 

Merlin is not hungry, but he has seen many of Gaius’s patients waste away from a hunger they can no longer feel. He takes the bowl.

“What happened?” he asks, steeling himself for a first spoonful. Eating is easier when he does not stop to think about it.

“You caught a fever.”

“How long ago?”

“Eight days.”

Merlin sucks in a breath. No wonder Gaius looks so exhausted; by rights, Merlin should be dead by now.

They sit in silence after that, until Merlin can stomach no more of the cold broth. Gaius takes the bowl, and does not scold him for managing less than half of it. Instead, he only straightens the blankets around Merlin’s legs.

“Rest now. We’ll talk more in the morning.”

Merlin wants to protest, wants to say that he can’t stand another minute in these sweat soaked clothes and stale sheets, but eating took more of his energy than he realized.

He sinks slowly back into sleep, Gaius’s concerned face the last thing he sees.

~*~

Every time he wakes, the glow is still waiting for him, presenting a unique challenge as he recovers. He desperately needs a wash, and someone to watch over him while Gaius goes about the rest of his duties, but until they know more the people they would trust to see him like this are few. 

They decide Percival will be both the most capable, and the most discrete.

Percival says nothing the first time he walks in, hauling buckets of water to be warmed above the fire. His smile is kindly, and he seems neither shocked nor put upon at being there, but still Merlin cannot quite look him in the eye. This silence persists as Percival undresses him, supporting his trembling legs and lifting him into the tub, his face burning with shame. Still, the water feels heavenly, and he does not protest when Percival sets about washing him as well. 

It is here that he speaks, upending a pitcher to wash the soap from Merlin’s back. 

“Do they hurt?”

“No,” Merlin says, a hand coming once again to his eyes. There is no golden sheen overlaying his vision, and he can see neither better nor worse than before. The glow doesn’t seem to be doing much of anything. 

“That’s good then.”

Merlin supposes it is.

~*~

There is only so long Gaius can keep the others away once they learn Merlin is awake. He shouldn’t be surprised that Gwaine is the first to strong-arm his way in. 

“What happened to your face?” is the first thing he says. Merlin throws a pillow at him. 

Arthur is next, followed by Gwen who is trailed by Elyan. It is only once Gaius throws up his hands and allows them in that Leon and Lancelot appear, ever the most respectful of authority.

The awkwardness is unbearable, surrounded by a small crowd that either will not meet his eyes or are openly staring. After less than an hour he feigns sleep to get them to leave, and it is not long before his sleep becomes genuine.

They return as the days roll on, and eventually only the occasional sideways look reminds him that anything is amiss at all.

It is Gwen who points the change out, sitting by his bedside with an embroidery hoop in hand.

“Merlin?” she says. “Your…” she points a finger in the general direction of his eyes, seemingly at a loss for words, before grabbing the mirror and holding it before him.

The glow is spreading.

Tiny rivers of light are shining through the skin just underneath his eyes. It must be in his veins. What else would make a pattern like that?

There is no pain, and they have no more idea of the cause now than they did before. There is nothing to do but watch it grow and grow and grow, up over his forehead and down across his chin.

Locked away in his chambers, he spends his nights curled up in bed, staring at a reflection that resembles nothing so much as a porcelain mask, ready to shatter.


	3. Of Growth

It is Lancelot who first notices his growing despondency, or at least he is the first to do something about it. He shows up in the middle of the night two weeks after Merlin’s fever broke, an oversized cloak in hand.

“I thought you might want to go for a ride.”

The cloak’s hood is large enough to slip low over his face, hiding most of the glow. It won’t be enough, he is like a walking torch at this point, but he is so desperate to get out that he does not care. 

Relying mostly on Lancelot’s feet for guidance, they make their way out of the city to where two horses have been left hitched to a post. Giddiness rising inside him, he hoists himself up and spurs it into a run as quickly as he can. 

He does not pay attention to where he is going. It does not matter. Camelot shines at night, the fire pits in the watchtowers creating a beacon they would be hard-pressed to lose. All that matters now is the wind rushing past, swallowing up his laughter and drowning out his heartbeat.

Camelot is not his prison, but it has grown to feel like one lately. 

Distantly, he can hear Lancelot giving chase behind him. It is easy to turn this into a game of cat and mouse, slowing just enough to let him draw near before darting off again, using trees, boulders, and small streams as obstacles. Lancelot catches on quickly, his own laughter mixing with shouted taunts and dares. 

Merlin is breathless when he finally slows to a stop, dismounting in a meadow that makes for good grazing ground. His horse deserves a rest after being pushed so hard.

Lancelot pulls up alongside him, and together they make their way into the center of the clearing, lying down on the grass. He takes a moment simply to feel, his body alight with every sensation as if they are brand new; the crisp breeze above him tickling his nose, the dewdrops soaking into his shirt and chilling his skin, even his own heartbeat seems magnified. It is a reminder than he is a living part of this world, not a shadow locked away in Gaius’s closet.

“Thank you for this,” he says, turning to face Lancelot. It is easy to forget that he is now a frightening thing to behold when Lancelot looks so calm laying there, his hands folded atop his stomach.

“Of course,” Lancelot says.

Merlin expects him to continue with some platitude about how everything will work out fine, he’s the type for speeches like that, but he stays quiet, his eyes falling shut as he rests. Merlin appreciates the silence.

~*~

It is nearly dawn when they return to Camelot.

Lancelot did eventually fall asleep, but Merlin spent the night wandering through the forest, enjoying the chance to stretch his legs. Every part of the experience felt fresh and new; the scratch of bark along his palms, the tickle of damp grass between his toes, the sweet smell of night blooming flowers in the air. It is amazing what only a couple of weeks in the same room can do to a man.

The iron gates of the city rising before them carry a sense of foreboding, in comparison.

Reluctantly, he draws his hood back over his face.

“Here,” Lancelot says, pulling up beside him, “you’ve got some flowers on your back.”

He brushes a hand across Merlin’s shoulder blades, white-hot fire following his touch. Merlin cries out in pain, arching his back so violently he nearly unseats himself. It is as if his skin is being flayed open, pulled by tiny hooks sunk deep into the muscle. Lancelot snatches his hand away.

He is barely aware of Lancelot grabbing both horses by the reins and guiding them toward the castle, too focused on the throbbing in his back. His head swims with the pain, until between one moment and the next they are back in Gaius’s chambers. He couldn’t begin to say how he made it up the stairs.

Lancelot sits him on the bed, a roused Gaius coming to stand by his side. They begin manhandling him out of his clothes, the cloak tossed aside and his shirt cut away from his body. He wants to protest. He liked that shirt.

Pain is a truly terrible thing, he decides. This feels as intense as the serket sting, but at least that had the good grace to knock him unconscious. There is no escape from this agony, every other sensation drowned out in its wake until he wonders if he’s ever felt anything different. Gaius and Lancelot are speaking, sometimes to him, sometimes to each other, but the words coalesce with the meaningless white noise that has become his entire world. 

Something cool is placed to his lips, Gaius’s fuzzy face hovering before him. He swallows without a thought.

~*~

He does not know how long he spends in this half aware state, his body warring against a drugged sleep. It is not until the potions stop coming that time begins flowing once again. 

He has been laid out on his side, pillows surrounding him to keep him from rolling over. For as blinding as the pain was, and indeed still is, for it has not disappeared completely, it is surprisingly easy to lift himself up. His arms are not as weak as they would be if a great deal of time had passed.

Lancelot is in the chair by his bedside, sitting vigil. He stands as soon as he sees Merlin awake.

“What happened?” Merlin asks.

Lancelot grimaces, an intense look of guilt on his face. “I’m sorry, I thought they were stuck to your cloak, but…” he holds out a cluster of small, wilted flowers, the only unusual thing about them being their brown stems.

“Gaius tried giving you things to help you sleep, but nothing worked until, well, until they started growing back.”

There is a disconnect between what Lancelot is saying and what he means, a gap Merlin cannot quite bridge. He remembers Lancelot saying there were flowers on his back, and not much after that. Were those the flowers? And what did he mean by growing back?

It hits him in an instant, a hand shooting up along his spine until his fingertips brush against something soft and tiny, protruding directly out of his skin.

The flower stems aren’t brown. They’re covered in dried blood.

“Those were…?” he asks, pointing at the flowers. He doesn’t think he can finish the question without being sick.

Lancelot nods, picking up that damnable mirror and giving him a view.

There are six shoots that he can see, spread out from the base of his neck to about the bottom of his ribcage. They are too small for him to tell what kind of plants they are, but anything beyond _there are plants growing out of my skin_ seems trivial.

There are _plants_ growing out of his _skin_.

Slowly, he lowers himself back onto the bed.

“I think I need a minute,” he says.

Lancelot seems to need one too.

~*~

The flowers continue to grow. Summer snowflakes dangle in rows along the slope of his shoulders, while water violet stalks burst from his low back, growing along the sides of his body until their flowers bloom by his armpits. Sea holly lines the groove of his spine, pricking him when he bends or twists too quickly. Snakes head, oxlip, honeysuckle, and poppies, along with others he has no name for, all turn his body into a riot of color and smell.

Gaius’s search for a cure grows ever more desperate. Merlin can hear him late into the night, shuffling through pages and muttering to himself. Sometimes he is joined by the others. They come to assist in the search, provide their own theories, or simply to vent their fears to a sympathetic ear, as if Merlin is not separated from them only by a flimsy wooden door. As if he cannot hear every word. 

One night, the entire Round Table gathers together in Gaius’s chambers, discussing the best course of action. They likely think they are debating. Merlin calls it squabbling.

“What if this is something that just has to run its course,” Elyan says. “Maybe he needs to be, I don’t know, outside for a while.”

Silence greets that statement, until Gwaine bursts out, “He’s not a fucking _tree_ , Elyan.”

Except he sort of is. The gossamer threads of light on his face have spread and expanded into thick cords all along his chest, like branches in bloom.

If he were to peel back his skin, would he find roots woven among his muscles? Would they wind up his bones like vines on a trellis, or coil around his organs into one shifting, tangled mass? Do they take water from his blood and air from his lungs? Is the glow their sunlight? 

If he stays still long enough, will he grow roots of his own?

He has lost the thread of the others’ conversation, and it is a surprise when Gwen peeks her head through his door. Gently, as if speaking to a child, she tells him that they’ve found a nice cabin for him out in the woods, where he’ll have more space to wander freely. Someone will be by to visit him every day, of course, and they won’t stop looking for a cure. He barely hears her.

Magic will get him banished from Camelot after all.

Exhausted, frightened, and angry, he starts to cry. When Gwen moves forward to wipe his cheeks, his tears slice her thumbs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Flowers growing out of people is a time honored fantasy trope, and one that I am very fond of.


	4. Of Drifting

The cabin he’s been placed in is spacious and well made, a piece of Arthur’s property set aside for hunting trips. The windows can be unlatched, and he leaves them and all the doors open through the days and nights. The breeze is relaxing.

Clothes become something of a problem. Just like with the cloak, the flowers will grow through anything he is wearing, making undressing impossible without tearing them out. That is a mistake he does not intend to repeat. Still, it is warm out and going naked is not so bad. At least he is alone, and he keeps a sheet on hand to drape over himself whenever someone comes by with a delivery of food.

Oddly enough, he is not repulsed by his body. He thinks he should be, that maybe he was at one point, but now he feels a tickle whenever he brushes his fingertips along the petals. He cannot think of them as anything but a part of himself.

He knows the others are unnerved, knows it by the way they stare directly into his eyes or somewhere off to the side, taking care never to glance at his exposed chest. He does not blame them for this. He is strange to them now, changing.

Hopefully into something better than he was before.

~*~

The forest sings. Far deeper than the birdsong surrounding him, it is a melody without words, a tune conveying darkness and time and hunger, but also stillness and beauty and new life. Listening to it, he thinks that he has never truly seen the forest for the trees, never seen it for the massive beast it is. The trunks become its ribs, the leaves in the wind its rippling muscle. Somehow, he thinks the tune is meant for him.

A woodpecker drowns out the melody, and in a fit of pique he blasts it from its perch. When it falls dead to the ground, he cries out in remorse and rushes to where it landed. He buries it at the base of the tree and hopes its family will forgive him.

Something digs up the corpse in the night and steals it away. 

~*~

Gwaine comes the next day, and he cannot stop thinking about the bird. He takes him to the spot it was buried, digs his toes into soil still stained with blood, and smashes his fist against the tree trunk. Gwaine jumps.

"Something  _stole_ it," he says, furious. He took a piece of the forest away, and now he cannot even give it back.

"It was probably a fox," Gwaine says. Merlin rounds on him, the same anger that killed the woodpecker boiling up inside him. It isn't until Gwaine takes two hurried steps back that Merlin stops, stricken.

Gwaine is afraid of him. 

Big, fat tears start rolling down his cheeks and Gwaine reaches his hands out, placating. Merlin collapses against his chest and sobs, anger and remorse and fear still rattling around inside of him.

He doesn't know what's  _happening_ to him.

Gwaine holds him, rubbing at his shoulders and making shushing noises in his ear, the same noise he uses on a startled horse. Is that what he is? A beast, like the forest? He thinks he might be; something unfit to dwell in the city. 

He doesn't want Gwaine to abandon him.

Gwaine guides him back inside and sits with him until he stops snuffling, his nose swollen and red. 

"Feeling better?" he asks, and Merlin nods, even though he really isn't. Calmer, maybe, but not better.

There is a thatch of spring gentian growing above his belly, and he snaps off one of the tiny blue flowers and tucks it behind Gwaine's ear. Maybe this piece of himself will help Gwaine remember him, even after he's forgotten himself.

Thin, watery sap flows from the wound like blood, but he tries to smile anyway.

~*~ 

Arthur begins showing up more after that. Merlin isn't sure what Gwaine told him to make him do that; it must be difficult, leaving the castle so often.

He brings card games with him, which is funny in that Merlin doesn't think he's ever played a card game in his life. Merlin appreciates the distraction.

"You don't have to watch over me, you know," he says, because he feels like he should.

"Yes I do," Arthur says. They don't mention it again.  

~*~

The cabin grows stifling around him. He keeps his ears pressed tight to the wooden planks as if he could hear the voices they used to contain, and when he can stand the silence no longer he retreats outside. The forest may have its own song, but he's grown skilled at picking out the individuals that make it up.

There is a family of squirrels in one of the nearby trees. A hawk stole away one of the children yesterday, and they are grieving. He wants to go help them.

"Really," Arthur says when he tells him this. He presses their shoulders tighter together and guides Merlin away. Merlin forgets about the squirrels, but Arthur keeps a hand tight around his shoulders anyway.

~*~

Merlin's bones start to crack. He notices it first in his toes, when one day he wakes and his pinkies are on the outside of his feet. They start growing longer, twisted, the knuckles pressing stark against his skin until he thinks they might burst through at any moment, and when they finally curl underneath his feet he loses the ability to walk without falling.

He  _knew_ he would grow roots.

Arthur finds him outside, his legs half buried in the soil. It took him some time to get there, but now he feels grounded and secure. All he has to do is wait.

"What are you doing?" Arthur asks.

"Growing," Merlin says, his eyes closed. He does not know that Arthur has approached until he feels his arms around his waist, trying to pull him out. "No!" he shouts, shoving Arthur away with all his strength. He keeps his eyes closed as he does, and does not realize that he has thrown Arthur a good ten feet away.

Arthur keeps his distance after that.

~*~

Standing in this resting place he's made for himself, the dreams return. A pathway opens up through this very forest, guided along by a voice that is almost but not quite familiar. He was supposed to go there, he remembers, only he's waited too long and now he can't walk. He'll never know who was guiding him along, never know what was waiting for him at the top of that hill.

Ugly sobs pour from him, and he wants Arthur by his side. Only he pushed Arthur away, didn't he? And now he is alone and no one will ever hear him calling, they will walk right by him and never see that he used to be a person, might still be one, if he focuses, and everything he knew and was will be lost forever.

And then Arthur is there.

He is trying to wipe away Merlin's tears, and just like with Gwen they slice at his skin, only he doesn't pull away. Merlin's face grows warm where the blood drips over it, but still Arthur tries to calm him. 

In desperation, Merlin takes Arthur's face between his hands and  _pushes_ every scrap of the dream at him. Arthur's eyes fog over and he shakes his head, disoriented, but when he comes back to himself he only looks at Merlin and says, "That's where you want to go?"

Merlin nods.

"Alright," Arthur says, and starts to dig him up.

~*~

Not once does Arthur complain about Merlin's weight, sweat pouring down his neck as he hauls them up the hillside. The path is there, just like the voice said, winding around and around this solitary hill. In steeper places, Merlin's unfeeling toes will catch on the grass, as if they want to re-root themselves.

At the top of the hill is a single standing stone, about waist high and two hand-widths wide. It has not been shaped in any way, nor are there any carvings on it, yet it has obviously been placed there. Moss grows around it, carrying the weight of its age.

 _That_ is what he's been dreaming of, he knows it. His urgings become almost frantic, slapping at Arthur's shoulder and tugging on his shirt as he points him forward. Arthur huffs, but moves them closer.

He places Merlin down.

A moment's hesitation, a brief acknowledgment that he is on the precipice of something he does not truly understand, and then Merlin is laying his palm flat against the stone. 

Warmth. Light. He is so small and yet he has never been bigger, stretching out in every direction growing tumbling crashing running - flying.

The voice greets him, bright with familiarity and welcome.  _You've done your part, Emrys. Rest now._

He does.


	5. Of Home

Gliding on an updraft, a raven that is not quite a raven flies over a standing stone on a lonely hilltop. This place is familiar to it, though it does not know why. A man draped in red is on his knees before the stone, as still as any prey in hiding. All around him, a meadow has come into bloom.

This brief moment of clarity passes, and the raven is just a raven again, uninterested in the goings on below it. It flies on. The man never looks up.

~*~

Far away, and yet no distance at all, a deer that is not quite a deer sees another man in red. Over the deafening sound of its own heartbeat and the tightness in its legs that say _flee!_ , the part of the deer that is not the deer knows it is about to die.

If it does not die, this man will go hungry, and that is an unbearable thought.

The deer tilts it head to the side, giving the man a clear shot at its neck. The man lowers his crossbow slightly, eyes narrowing in confusion, before recognizing the opportunity he’s been given and firing.

The deer dies, and is glad for it.

~*~ 

On the branches of a forest made of stone, a songbird that is not quite a songbird sits in wait. It does not like this stone forest, there is nothing to eat here, but a hawk has caught sight of it and it must wait if it wants to live.

Below it, a woman sits on a bench. She has food with her, and the bird takes a chance by flying closer.

She jumps when it lands on her knee, but does not shoo it away. It was right, she does share tiny pieces of her food, tiny for her but more than enough for it. When it presses its head against her fingers in thanks, she laughs.

The bird knows this sound, and rejoices in it.

~*~ 

Thousands, maybe millions of stories like these repeat themselves across the land in an instant, until that _something else_ starts to recognize itself as something separate.

Merlin—for it is Merlin, even if he does not know it yet—starts to wake up.

But there is so _much!_ He is the birds in the sky and the air rushing through their feathers; he is the water in the rivers and the fish moving through them; he is the quick flight of a day old insect and the enduring patience of a one thousand year old yew tree. It is more than he could possibly comprehend, and he sinks into nothing but sensation.

~*~

It is the castle that draws him back. It is big, heavy enough that he can feel its weight pressing down on his skin (does he have skin? Did he ever?). He works himself into the stone and mortar, feels the pounding of a thousand footsteps like drumbeats.

He sees many people, but one in particular draws his attention. It is the same man he saw through the eyes of the raven, though the red skin he wore has been discarded. Merlin feels the splash of his tears on the floor.

That won’t do. Merlin does not truly know this man, but he wants to comfort him. Wants it in a way that moves past want and into instinct. He enters the room as a breeze through the open window, lifting one of the blankets and draping it around his shoulders in place of the arms he does not have.

It has the opposite effect, startling the man out of whatever trance like state he’s fallen into. He shakes the blanket off, swiping roughly at his face before striding out of the room, the door slamming shut behind him.

~*~

Merlin follows the man everywhere, though perhaps follow is not the right word. He is everywhere in the castle at once. It is not intentional, but there is nowhere the man can go where Merlin cannot see him. This does not strike Merlin as invasive. Concepts like privacy are far beyond him at the moment.

The man provides a focal point, and the more Merlin watches, the more he learns. He learns that the man is named Arthur, and he is King of this land that Merlin now occupies. There are other men with those red skins he now knows are cloaks, and a woman who is not yet but will be Queen. He knows them too.

He thinks these are things he already knew, but he can’t be sure.

They are grieving, all of them, though Merlin does not know why. He does his best to help. The night is always bright where they walk in the dark, and flowers bloom along the paths they take most often. He fixes rusty hinges on doors before they open them and keeps their clothing warm and sturdy and free of holes.

Everyone is subdued on the day of the wedding, but it is the sunniest day Camelot has seen all year.

~*~

Merlin is not only in the city, and sometimes he gets distracted. He spends springtime in the wilds rejoicing in all the new life until he is pulled deep beneath the earth, feeling the way his bones shift in unimaginable heat and pressure, so incredibly slowly.

When he resurfaces, things have changed. Arthur seems somewhat older. A beard has appeared on his face and his hair has grown long, while the long-haired-knight's has been cut short. There is a swell to the Queen’s stomach, and the old physician is no longer there. These changes catch him off guard. Birth and death he understands, along with the turning of the seasons, but time is another matter.

They also panic him. He does not want to miss these people’s lives.

~*~

Arthur has three children now, all girls. The councilors grumble over this, worrying about the line of succession, but their parents love them all very much. Merlin loves them too. The youngest is fond of rabbits. Merlin visits her often.

~*~

The kingdom is not always at peace, and he feels the moment an invading army has set foot onto his land.

Arthur has known of this for some time, and has prepared his army to meet theirs in pitched combat. Merlin does not like this, though he tries not to interfere. He wants to help Arthur, not control him.

But he finds he cannot help himself just before the armies are about to clash. There is such a vast difference between a pointless death and a purposeful one, and this is pointless.

A chasm splits the field with a deafening roar, boulders tumbling into the depths while all the surrounding lands sway as they readjust. The armies come to an immediate halt, staring gobsmacked at this un-crossable barrier between them. The invading army takes this as an ill omen (which they should) and retreats. Merlin’s satisfaction ripples up through the trees.

~*~

After that, Arthur starts growing watchful, peering around corners and through windows as if he could put a face to this force that follows him. At about the same time, Merlin remembers his name.

It is a sudden revelation, yet it feels like one he has been building to for some time. He remembers the standing stone on the hilltop and the meadow that still blooms around it, timeless. He understands that in some way, that meadow is him.

He remembers what it was like to be human.

His tears rain down on the kingdom in a torrential downpour, his screams echoing in the howling wind. Does the fact that he was no longer needed mean he was no longer wanted as well? Why is he never granted a choice?

He is not human, but whatever he was before is lost to him as well.

Will he spend eternity caught in-between?

~*~ 

Arthur descends into paranoia, and Merlin hates himself for doing this to him, but he cannot stop.

He wants to be _seen._

His time in the world of men is over, but still he tries to push at that barrier. He can do things as mundane as open doors to things as grand as diverting the course of a river. None of this tells anyone who he is.

Arthur believes himself haunted.

The day it finally works, Merlin does not know what Arthur sees. His shadow splitting into two, a split-second reflection in a mirror, the echo of a memory made solid. It does not matter. All his efforts are worth it when Arthur looks around his empty room and says—

“Merlin?”

~*~

In a meadow on a lonely hilltop, an old man cloaked in red goes to die.

The flowers welcome him home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's all folks!
> 
> In my defense, I did put bittersweet ending right there in the tags lol. The ending also ended up being a lot more Arthur&Merlin centric than I imagined it would, so I put that tag in. Nothing in the actual story has changed.
> 
> This is by far the weirdest thing I've ever written, so I hope you enjoyed! Thanks for reading!


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